Football Season Begins With A Bang

Is it just me or is everyone else just as excited as I am that the regular season is here this week already…???

With the first official weekend of the season ending with the Corky Kell Classic this Saturday on GPB through all of our platforms: TV, the web at gpb.org, Facebook at GPB Sports (go for the “like” there), and Twitter (@GPBsports,) it’s going to be a lot of fun…

But, before we get into football full bore, I wanted to be one of the many on our end to thank the folks behind the scenes at “Football Fridays” along with our friends at Turner Productions that make this go off without a hitch… it’s a cast of hundreds at GPB and Turner that you’ll see at the end of the credits early Saturday morning and without them, the broadcast simply would not be what it is…

I tell people that live television is like watching a dog paddle in a lake…

The dog above the water line is what everyone watching TV sees… working hard toward his or her task of getting to shore…

The dog below the water line is what goes on behind the scenes. We never see the dog swimming his legs off under water, but all of those frantic (or in Live TV’s case- “hopefully not frantic”) movements are what make it work…

So, when you’re watching the Kell, think of all the stuff below that makes it go…

Okay…now to actual football…

There are a lot of games on Friday night that have a lot of regional meaning in the state of Georgia. But the first game on the list is in Homerville. It’s the first game of the season for Brooks County as they take on Clinch County in a great non-region matchup…

Here’s Panthers head coach Jim Dickerson about what Football Fridays mean in Homerville…

There’s also the “War of the Roses” game in Thomasville between the Bulldogs and Thomas County Central. Lowndes handled Thomasville in the Friday scrimmage, 41-0, and TCC (and an “improvised passing attack”) took care of Turner County 49-12 in a scrimmage that took the place of a scrimmage that got washed out earlier in the day.

Metro Atlanta Area schools dot the landscape with week one games: Whitewater and Coffee, Newnan and Marietta, DeKalb County is pretty active as is Cobb, Lovett plays Woodward Academy, and Westminster has Blessed Trinity…

But Burke County plays Thomson (A good early season test for the Bulldogs), Dalton plays Ringgold, JeffCo plays Fitzgerald, Washington County has Eagle’s Landing Christian, MCA plays Glynn, and Landmark has Calvary Day, and Lincoln County has their traditional game with McCormick (SC)…

Faithful reader: Your first question of the year…

What opening week game are you looking forward to the most…???

One of the teams to look for in the public side of Single-A comes from the toughest region in the state: 2-A…

Wilcox County has a bit of rebuilding to do since they lost Makhail Grace at quarterback…
Big Marvin took the trip to Rochelle…
((HT: 13WMAZ-TV))

In Region 1-6A, we get the chance to see Colquitt County at the Corky Kell Classic. And I will maintain that this region is the toughest in the country…

No debate… end of discussion…

I still think the state title game will feature a team from region 1 and someone from the city of Atlanta- probably, Norcross… and their 60 seniors (that number is still amazing to me…)

One of the tough teams in region 1 is in Tifton… and the Blue Devils will be trying to rebound from a winless season last year in that part of their schedule…